35: Hard Vacuum

terminal 0

unfinished

------------------------------------------- --1/2:begin_burst_historical_transmission-- ------------------------------------------- {period transfer} {entry begin} File Summary: This historical transmission is intended to serve as an enclosure of supporting information to file #iso-342107 (caution: file referenced not found). It documents the important resultant political and social events following directly after the Human/Pfhor war.

{begin file contents 1/2} The Pfhor capitulated soon after the Dangi Corporation's treason was revealed. When the invasion force finally landed around the high Pfhor citadel, they found the slaver ranks in total disarray. Order had collapsed when word of a human land assault reached the high council, striking the final blow to the sovereignty of the Pfhor gentry. In the years that followed, client races and slaves rose up in rebellion against their former masters, creating a power vacuum that many aspiring ex slaves and ex Pfhor military commanders tried to fill. Over the next century, governments on the former Pfhor systems would rise and fall in a constant struggle for power.

Pfhor Prime itself was stripped of all installations and technologies that could conceivably be used to start a new empire. All databanks were emptied, and the Pfhor-controlled AIs were transported to UESC labs for study. {entry endsegment} {period transfer_getnextEvent&} ------------------------------------------- ---1/2:end_burst_historical_transmission--- -------------------------------------------

<tag 1>

terminal 1

unfinished

------------------------------------------- --2/2:begin_burst_historical_transmission-- ------------------------------------------- {period transfer} {entry begin} The researchers and directors of the Dangi Corporation were long gone by the time the UESC finally gained control of the Salinger, and UESC forces found the onboard computer databanks to be empty. The only information left on the Salinger's mainframe was the location of Dangi's secret refuge planet, text that was prominently displayed on every functioning terminal in the station and echoed over the stationwide intercom.

When UESC dropships landed on their refuge planet, the Dangi directors and managers were arrested after a brief battle with the remains of Dangi security. The ensuing trials were a spectacle that lasted nearly three years and enthralled viewers on all of the human worlds. In the end, all of the Dangi executives were found guilty of treason and publicly executed. While most of the Salinger's secrets were revealed over the course of the trials, a single mystery remained unsolved. The Dangi virus researchers were absent from both the refugee planet and the station's decks during the UESC takeover. No theory has since been able to convincingly explain their disappearance.

The end of the war removed the need for remote weapons testing facilities such as the Salinger, and the UESC eventually cut funding to the project. The Salinger station was left intact and sealed off, an abandoned reminder of the great risk greed and corruption can pose to any civilized society. {entry endsegment} {period transfer_end&} ------------------------------------------- ---2/2:end_burst_historical_transmission--- -------------------------------------------

<tag 2>

terminal 2

unfinished

Maybe fate likes fools. Or maybe fools are the only ones smart enough to like fate. Simple game theory dictated that they couldn’t fire on me. I had the formula in my mind and they’d have to tear it out one neuron at a time. They would, so I ran. Out the door, past the cameras, past the guards, and into the alleyway. Living it all as though I’ve done it before, and as though it couldn’t have happened any other way. Down into the sewer, back out onto the street, and running towards the horizon.

The horizon never gets any closer. You run and you run and the only thing you can think of after three days is the knife strapped to your shin. And then it’s all you can do to keep yourself from reaching down in the split second of that insanity they call heroism, pulling out the knife and cutting your own legs off, knowing that if you don’t you’ll keep on running. You can’t run away forever.